Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Delicious cigarettes

I decided to have a shorter and more eye-catching blog post title this time (which I noticed other bloggers do, so I thought I ought to try it out too :P ).

Anyway, this my final illustration for Illustration Topics, in progress. I really like where it's going right now; I'm using some elements of texture that I have not really done before, and I'm excited about the color as well (I have to give credit to Tom Garrett, and also Teagan White, for some of the color suggestions. One of these days I will absorb their color know-how into my brain well enough to think of good backdrops and line colors and such). I'm not sure how I like using the realistically drawn figure; BUT, I do like how I have it kinda surreal, with her cut off, and the floating cigarettes.. in some weird way I like that...weirdness, instead of a completely realistic illustration.

Oh, and what it's about: we had several short phrases or just single words to select from, and I chose 'Delicious' (I also considered 'Chain Reaction'...so, somehow this may be related to that, too). Anyway, it's about cigarettes and people who smoke them, and how 'deliciously addictive' they are, but then at the same time obviously unhealthy; but people for some reason like doing this unhealthy, maybe 'edgy' thing, and sometimes they even try to make it look glamorous or sexy. But in the end it's just unhealthy, and I personally don't understand why people smoke, and I think the attraction factor goes way down (in my book at least) when I find out someone smokes. So, it may be about seeing an attractive person, then finding out they smoke, and then that's all I can think about, forgetting about the initial attraction.

It MAY change in composition for the final, but probably not. There will be more textures on the smoke probably...we shall see where it goes. It's going to be a 30" x 40" print out :O

Holy cow! This looks so good! It's different from your usual, but I can definitely still see your hand in it. I love the colors and the layering of texture that you're getting. Can't wait to see the final!